Meet Madhurya-lila Roe | Vegan Baker & Owner of Lila’s Sweets

I’m pretty sure it’s in my blood. My dad worked at Pfizer for most of my life but always had side projects going–mostly working on custom motorcycles, fixing up antique cars and repairing anything with a motor. Around 50, he left his day job and opened up his own motorcycle shop in the small town I grew up in. Even then, he kept other side hustles going–from running a hot dog stand in a nearby state park, to selling high-end guitars on Ebay, to auctioning off his Red Sox season tickets for home games he couldn’t attend. He was extremely creative and saw the opportunity to make money in almost any circumstance or scenario. I think, without realizing it, that spirit and way of seeing the potential to monetize something rubbed off on me.

I spent all of my 20s working for someone else–from a law school in Boston, to a family-owned entertainment law firm in Brentwood, to managing six yoga studios for CorePower Yoga. Throughout that time, I always dreamt of having my own business but couldn’t bear to walk away from the security that came with these steady gigs. Then in, 2018, after a lengthy battle with cancer, my dad passed away. I had spent the better part of that year in Connecticut taking care of him and we spent a lot of time talking about how I would have my own business one day.

A few months after he passed, I quit CorePower and started working at a small vegan cafe in Long Beach. I had known the owner for years and was recruited to help streamline their operations. Within a few months, I was managing the place. I hadn’t worked in food since I went vegetarian in high school–and it rekindled my fondness for cooking and specifically, my absolute love of baking.

Three years later, it felt really natural to start Lila’s Sweets. And I feel like it’s something my dad would be truly proud of.

Lila’s Sweets is a one-woman 100% vegan bakery pop-up specializing in cookies, pop tarts and candy that feel simultaneously familiar and out-of-the-box. Think Oreo cookies flavored with ube, cinnamon sugar pop tarts glazed with Thai tea icing, peanut butter cookies filled with vegan marshmallows, and all your childhood candy favorites made without eggs, dairy or any other (often strange) animal products.

If you had asked me if one day I would be starting a vegan bakery business some 20 years ago, I probably would have said “Yes, for sure.” I’ve been baking since I can remember. My aunts, cousins and mom were all avid bakers. I have so many memories of us baking cookies and cakes all year long for holidays, birthdays, and just for fun. That said, I got a film degree, worked for several lawyers, then taught at and managed yoga studios for the better part of a decade, so my path was anything but direct. I took the most interesting opportunities that came my way in my 20s when I was trying to, frankly, just make a living in LA. Baking took a serious backburner while I worked my way up the corporate ladder–but it returned with a serious vengeance by 2020 when I was running a small vegan restaurant. With zero dine-in foot traffic that year, I had more time to be creative. And it rekindled my romance with baking and sweets, this time without the eggs and butter my family had taught me to use in almost every recipe they had passed down.

By now, most people have heard of or even tried going vegan. It’s a lot less terrifying to try and sell people vegan desserts–it’s gone from being something I was made fun of as a teenager to a mainstream trend in fashionable diets. It makes my job a lot easier for a couple reasons, one of which is that the sheer amount and quality of vegan substitutes for butter, eggs, milk, etc. that exist on the market these days is overwhelming. And as more and more of these items hit the market, the price point for them has dropped considerably at the same time that the quality of them rises. The reason this excites me so much is that it makes it so much easier for people who might otherwise not try a plant-based diet do so. The excuse that “it’s so expensive” or “it doesn’t taste good” doesn’t hold water these days. And I believe the more people that go plant-based, the better off they’ll be–not to mention the environment.

Most of us live in a world where it’s completely unnecessary to eat animals. There is some serious disassociation happening when the same people who consider their dog their child are also eating bacon for breakfast. Or chicken for dinner. Our laws protect animals from being beaten or tortured by us but we’ve created other laws that make exceptions to this rule for animals that are considered commodities and can therefor, be killed for consumption. I don’t usually get into this stuff too hard with people because it makes them really uncomfortable and understandably so. I’m challenging the way they live their life. I figure the best thing I can do is give someone a vegan cookie and have them be surprised it’s vegan with the hopes of one day they will consider going plant-based.

Ace Hotel in Palm Springs. It’s relaxed, the music is on point and the robes are cozy and fun to hang out in. A fun Airbnb in Joshua Tree or Twentynine Palms for an even more remote, quieter retreat that includes stargazing from a hot tub with zero light pollution and having vegan s’mores over an open fire.
Then Laguna Beach for an easy beach day, lunch at The Stand and maybe a hike to Top of the World around sunset.

Then Venice Beach because it’s such a scene and one I think anyone visiting the area should experience at least once. I lived there for a few years and enjoy visiting every now and again to see how much it’s changed year over year. And I’m obsessed with the Brass Monkey at Butcher’s Daughter.